BATON ROUGE — Junior guard Katherine Graham drained her first eight shots en route to a career-high 24 points, and the 18th-ranked LSU women’s basketball team returned to the win column, 69-52, over South Carolina on Thursday night at the Pete Maravich Assembly Center.
“I am pleased we won, but I am equally as pleased with how we won tonight,” LSU head coach Van Chancellor said. “We won against a really good team. We out-rebounded them, we had fewer turnovers than they did, we took quality shots, and we played smart. We had a lot of enthusiasm early and I think the Lady Tigers have to play a certain way.”
The Lady Tigers (14-3, 3-2 Southeastern Conference) snapped a two-game losing skid and never trailed against the Gamecocks. The win vaulted LSU back over the .500 mark in league play and set the stage for a showdown with No. 3 Tennessee at 5 p.m. CST Sunday in the Maravich Center.
The Lady Vols were a 53-50 loser at Georgia on Thursday night. LSU will retire the jersey of Seimone Augustus prior to Sunday’s game. Fans are asked to arrive by 4:30 p.m. to watch the ceremony.
The first 2,000 fans in attendance will receive a free Seimone Augustus mini banner, similar to the one that will hang in the rafters of the Maravich Center. Halftime entertainment includes a performance from the popular Quickchange.
South Carolina (10-8, 3-3) saw its three-game winning streak come to an end as they fell to the Lady Tigers for the 14th straight time dating back to 1999. The Gamecocks’ last win over LSU occurred at the 1998 SEC Tournament.
LSU’s stingy defense, which surrendered 80 points for the first time in nearly six years on Sunday at Ole Miss, returned to its attacking ways and shut down one of the SEC’s premier scorers.
Senior guard Allison Hightower, who finished with 16 points, held South Carolina’s Valerie Nainima to five points on just 2-of-9 shooting. Nainima entered Thursday’s game with an 18.5 scoring average that ranked third in the SEC.
Graham torched the Gamecocks for 22 points in the first half as she finished 8-of-8 from the floor in the first 20 minutes. Sophomore forward LaSondra Barrett erupted for 14 second-half points to finish with 18, her fifth straight double-figure game.
“Just talking to Coach Travis (Mays), he wanted me to be more aggressive,” Graham said. “That was the difference, he thought, in the Auburn and South Carolina games with my play. Just stay focused throughout the rest of the game, that’s what I tried to do to help the team.”
Sophomore point guard Destini Hughes, who started in place of the injured Latear Eason, matched a career high with six assists. Eason injured her collarbone in practice on Tuesday and is listed as day-to-day.
With the score 10-8 in favor of LSU, the Lady Tigers separated the margin with a 14-0 run that was ignited by Graham. She scored the final seven points of the run, including back-to-back jumpers near the 12-minute mark. Her jumper with 10:17 left extended the lead to 28-10, LSU’s largest lead of the game.
LSU closed out the first half at 56.0 percent from the floor to take a 39-26 lead into the locker room. South Carolina managed to carve the lead under double-digits in the first five minutes of the second half, but Hightower responded with four straight points.
Barrett then found her rhythm scoring all eight of LSU’s points during an 8-2 spurt that spanned over two minutes. She made layups on three straight possessions culminating at the 7:12 point that gave LSU a 62-48 cushion.
Hightower added an off-balance 3-pointer from the top of the key with the shot clock winding down that was a back breaker for South Carolina with 6:10 to play. Graham’s jumper three minutes later put the game away.
“I lost my handle, and I just heard ‘Three, two…,” Hightower said. “I just had to spin around and just shoot it, and it went in. It was a lucky shot.
South Carolina went the final 6:46 without a field goal and finished at 40.4 percent from the floor for the game.
HEAD COACH VAN CHANCELLOR
Opening Statement …
“LSU has had some big regular season wins, but I don’t believe LSU has had a bigger regular season win than this one. We had just not been playing LSU basketball the past two games. I wasn’t upset we lost, I was upset how we were losing. I am pleased we won, but I am equally as pleased with how we won tonight. We won against a really good team. We out-rebounded them, we had fewer turnovers than they did, we took quality shots, and we played smart. We had a lot of enthusiasm early and I think the Lady Tigers have to play a certain way.”
On shutting down South Carolina’s three point attack …
“I thought that was one of the big keys. We were going to double the ball and not give up a lot of three-balls. I thought that we set out with a plan tonight and executed it. We set out and executed it really well.”
On how important it is to be aggressive early …
“That seems to be the key of how we play. It is an amazing thing, if we start well we get a little confidence and I think that is important. We got some tough rebounds tonight and the ball wasn’t slipping out of our hands. We got some tough rebounds in a crowd. I am going to give you some amazing stats on LaSondra Barrett. She had 18 points and eight rebounds in 21 minutes of play. That is pretty good.”
On how he has coached better since the Auburn game …
“I just trusted them too much. We are still inexperienced. I just made up my mind that I was going to use my timeouts early if we needed them. During the Auburn game when they pressed us I just let it run. Tonight when they got us and pressed us I called a timeout and changed their press offense. I was much more involved in the game. In the Auburn game I waited until the end, and I should have called some timeouts earlier because we are still a young time. Tonight, when it got cut to eight I wasn’t going to save a timeout. I was going to use it and not let them make a run on us.”
LSU PLAYER QUOTES
Guard Katherine Graham
On how she was able to score 22 points in the first half…
“I don’t know. I got some lucky drops and some and-ones. Just talking to Coach Travis (Mays), he wanted me to be more aggressive. That was the difference, he thought, in the Auburn and South Carolina games with my play. Just stay focused throughout the rest of the game, that’s what I tried to do to help the team.”
On the importance of building and protecting their first half lead…
“It was very important. We’re a team that, once we build a lead, we try to keep the lead. When we built an 18-point lead, we knew they were going to make a run. We were just trying to contain it and continue to play good defense and take good shots.”
On playing well tonight…
“I knew I’m a big part of this team so I knew how I would play would be kind of how the team would play. I mean, I’ve been telling you that for the whole week so I just tried to come out and play well.”
Guard Allison Hightower
On her off-balance three-pointer in the second half…
“I lost my handle, and I just heard ‘Three, two…’ I just had to spin around and just shoot it, and it went in. It was a lucky shot. That’s about it.”
On the play of point guard Destini Hughes, starting in place of Latear Eason…
“We just wanted to keep encouraging her. We wanted her to know that we are here for her and that we’re a team and we’ve got her back. I think she did a great job running the team tonight. We’re going to need that from her, so I think she stepped it up in a big way.”
SOUTH CAROLINA HEAD COACH DAWN STALEY
Opening Statement …
“We got off to a tough start. I think our players let (Katherine) Graham loose in the beginning and we were playing uphill from there.”
On Katherine Graham …
“I think as a player you want to get in the zone like she did. It’s hard to stop a player like that. She did more in the first ten minutes of the game than most players wish to do. Some players don’t have entire games like her first ten minutes or so.”
On the problems LSU posed for them in the game …
“It’s hard to guard LSU man-to-man. We knew that coming into the game, but we just couldn’t get past the first eight minutes of the game. We just couldn’t get the pace of it. LSU started to build a lead and we couldn’t overcome it. We fought back a little bit, but couldn’t get a couple of shots to fall on our run. (LSU) hit big shot after big shot all night.”
On what disrupted South Carolina’s comeback in the second half …
“Ill-advised shots and costly turnovers kept us from closing that gap and catching up in the second half along with some miscues on the defensive end. We have a young basketball team that has a lot of good basketball left to play. This was a setback, and we’re just going to have to get back on it.”
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